Frozen Justice, a Tale of Shate
by ChuckReader
Summary: One last Shate for jaytoyz's challenge


Sarah almost couldn't contain her emotions as she watched Chuck walk through the doors of the Buy More, a determined expression on his face, with a pistol raised towards Daniel Shaw. Chuck had shed all remnants of the affable, goofy nerd. The look in his eyes was different than other times when he'd seen her in danger but she could nonetheless identify it. Chuck had come to kill Daniel Shaw.

Sarah cursed herself for once again letting Shaw get the best of her. She impotently pulled at the handcuffs that secured her to the Nerd Herd desk in a feeble attempt to prevent Chuck from losing his innocence in this most violent way. She had put them in danger and she wanted to get them out of it and wipe the smirk off that damned smirker standing above her.

"Chuck!" she shouted.

That was when all the power went out. The musical stylings of Jeffster were silenced. Three well-aimed tranquilizer darts flew through the air and impacted on their targets.

Sarah slowly felt consciousness returning. She knew she'd been tranquilized because she recognized the symptoms; nausea, disorientation and a taste in her mouth as though she'd been feeding off the liquid from the bottom of a dumpster in Chinatown. Yeah, she was familiar with tranquilizers all right. Her most recent experience had been when Chuck was twirling his pistol on his finger like an old west gunslinger and accidentally shot her in the ass with a dart. She hadn't yet succumbed before seeing that her poor nerd had been so embarrassed and afraid of her reaction that he reached behind his back and shot his own ass too. Casey had walked in and nearly caused a panic seeing his two partners on the floor of Castle. He locked down the facility and alerted the General just as Sarah woke up and explained what had happened in time to defuse the situation.

Sarah opened her eyes to see a bright light shining in her face. Squinting, she looked around, taking in her surroundings. She was secured to a steel chair by her wrists and ankles. A groan coming from her left told her she wasn't alone. Turning her head in that direction she saw Chuck. He was bound in the same way and blinking his eyes against another bright light pointed at his own face. Sarah looked to her right and saw Shaw, also locked up, but he looked like he'd been awake for a few minutes already. He faced forward and didn't acknowledge her.

A door opened and closed and the sounds of heels striking the hard floor approached.

"Well, well, well," a woman's voice chided. "My three little prima donnas are awake."

"Who are you?" Chuck blurted out.

There was no answer but the sound of the woman's heels as she walked behind Shaw.

"Oww, what the hell?" Shaw yelled when his captor smacked him across the back of his head with the wooden baton she was carrying.

"I didn't say any of you could talk."

"But he's the one who talked, not me. Hit him. Oww, dammit!" The second strike was no less painful.

"That's cool," Chuck said, "so if I say something then Shaw gets busted in the head?" Sarah nearly giggled because, as usual and despite their circumstances, Chuck was finding a silver lining.

"Shut up Carmichael. I will ask questions and you three will answer. When I'm satisfied I'll decide if any of you walk out of here alive."

Silence was the response to her statement. The three captives could only hear the woman as she walked around them but the bright lights prevented them from seeing her.

"So," the questioning began, "Special Agent Daniel Shaw. What makes you so special Daniel?"

"What?" Shaw replied. Immediately he was struck on the neck with the baton.

"I asked what makes you so special. What purpose do you serve in this life Daniel?"

"What?" Another baton strike, this time to the jaw. Shaw was teetering as he moved in and out of consciousness.

"Say 'what' again!" Chuck couldn't help from letting the 'Pulp Fiction' line spew from his lips. The sound of a tranquilizer gun erupted and Chuck's head slumped forward.

"He never knew when to keep quiet. We don't really need him for this anyway. Now," she said returning to the matter at hand, "you really aren't too smart are you Daniel? I want to know the purpose of your existence so let's recap. You showed up out of nowhere and were put in charge of the most highly classified operation in the American intelligence community because you were supposedly some sort of expert on the organization known as the Ring. You were hell bent on avenging your wife's murder, allegedly at the hands of the Ring, but still found the time to play nursemaid to a weepy Agent Walker. Or is it Sam?" she asked, sparing a look at Sarah. "Daniel, you did nothing but draw Ring agents to you like moths to a flame, and proved quite incompetent as a spy too. In fact the only thing you were good at was making Sam here go weak in the knees. But then you found out that Sam was the one who killed your wife and you lost what little sanity you had left." She paused and watched Shaw's lips curl in a bloody snarl and then she looked over at Sarah to see her eyes glistening.

"Aww, Agent Walker, does it hurt your precious feelings to know you killed Daniel's wife? Surely you've killed many others so why does Evelyn Shaw's death bother you?"

"It was my red test. My first kill," Sarah said as she was staring down at the floor. "It was the worst night of my life. I could never go back to being the person I was before."

"It's a difficult time," her captor agreed, "changing from what was once pure and innocent and clean and turned into an instrument of violence with newly shed blood on your hands. I imagine your partner had to stay up with you all night the same way my partner did with me. "

"We didn't talk too much," Sarah said as she recalled that night. "I sat on the floor and cried and he held me when I needed it and listened when I spoke." She was crying now, remembering the pain.

Suddenly turning much colder Sarah's captor snapped at her. "That's not the last red test you were involved with, was it?"

"No, I assigned Chuck his red test."

"Hmm, Carmichael doesn't seem the killing sort. At least he had you to help him through it when he was done, to comfort him, the way your partner was there for you."

"No," Sarah whispered shaking her head.

"No?" her captor asked.

"I ignored his calls and stayed in my apartment. I left him alone." Sarah was sobbing uncontrollably. Even though Chuck never confronted her about her actions during that time this woman was taking her to task now.

The tranquilizer gun was raised again but there was one more thing to say first.

"Agent Walker, the next time you look at Agent Carmichael, I want you to remember how you felt right now and why. I want you to never leave him alone again. I made that mistake a long time ago."

Sarah's chin dropped into her chest when the dart hit her neck.

The sharp sound of the feminine heels could be heard as they approached Shaw from behind, stopping at his right side.

"WAKE UP SHAW!" The words were punctuated with heavy baton strikes to the already beaten agent's ribs. The sound of the breaking bones echoing throughout the room. Shaw was groaning and wailing at the sudden excruciating pain. He was struggling to breathe and feared the sharp ends of his broken ribs were tearing at his lung.

"Please," he moaned, "what do you want? I'll tell you anything. I have no loyalties."

"I'm not here to get information from you Shaw. I'm here to beat you to death." The cold, even, tenor of her voice offered no doubt that the statement was true.

"But why? Who are you?"

"My name is Mary Bartowski," Chuck's mom said as she commenced swinging the baton.

Several minutes later Mary was breathing heavily. Her prey was no longer identifiable by the usual means, not that anyone would care since no one would miss him. She reached into her pocket and pulled out her phone.

"Eleanor, it's me baby. It's done. Justice has been served for your father's murder. Keep your eye on Charles, he needs you. I'll see you in a few months. Mommy's coming home."


End file.
